DeepMind computer program beats humans at Go

Mastering arcade games seems cute by comparison.Researchers at DeepMind, the Google-owned artificial intelligence lab, announced Wednesday they had achieved a breakthrough not thought possible for at least another decade: a computer program that defeats humans at Go, an enormously complicated strategy game.Their work, published in the journal Nature, is a significant leap forward from the algorithm that Google DeepMind unveiled last year, which could beat Atari games like Breakout and Space Invaders.The team is now gunning for an even bigger trophy. In March, almost exactly 20 years after IBM’s Deep Blue computer first faced off against Garry Kasparov in a historic chess match, their program will challenge Lee Sedol, the world Go champion.Exponentially more complicated than chess, Go is considered a “grand challenge” for artificial intelligence because it cannot be…